Summary: James W. Cooke, commander of the Ironclad
ram CSS Albemarle, sailed out of Plymouth in early May 1864. Steaming south toward New Bern, Cooke ran into the Union
fleet, commanded by Captain Melancton Smith, at the mouth of Albemarle Sound, Smith with an advantage in numbers could
do little damage to the single Confederate ship. Shots glanced and bounced off the Albemarle's sides. The USS
Sassacus next rammed the Albemarle at top speed and caused some significant damage. The Albemarle
began taking on water but the Sassacus had also sustained damage from the impact and a single shot that had burst
one of its boilers scalding the crew. The rest of the Union fleet managed to recapture a converted steamer called the Bombshell.
The Sassacus, now too damaged to even function, drifted down river while the Albemarle had sustained
enough damage causing it to break and make way back to Plymouth.

The battle itself was inconclusive, but the events that followed had more
decisive results. The Albemarle had held its own against greater numbers but the damages caused during the battle
had forced the ironclad into port for the next several months, thus preventing it from being used in General Hoke's
planned assault on New Bern. Hoke forced the campaign at New Bern, but without the Albemarle, only to be recalled
to Virginia to assist in the defense of the Confederate capital of Richmond during the nearly ten month Siege of Petersburg. The events in October had a greater impact on the situation when William B. Cushing led a naval raid and detonated
a torpedo beneath the hull. The removal of Hoke's force and the destruction of the Albemarle allowed both Plymouth
and Washington, North Carolina, to fall back into Union hands.

CSS Albemarle ironclad ram

Ironclad ram CSS Albemarle

History: The Battle of Albemarle Sound was an
inconclusive naval engagement, May 5, 1864, along the coast of North Carolina during the American Civil War, between
three Confederate warships, including the Ironclad ram CSS Albemarle, and a Union squadron of eight Navy gunboats,
led by USS Mattabesett. The action ended indecisively, a draw, due to the sunset.

During the Civil War practically every ironclad warship
was built in the traditional shipyard, but the CSS Albemarle was constructed in a humble Southern cornfield.

On May 5, 1864, the CSS
Albemarle
weighed anchor and proceeded down the Roanoke River for New Bern.
On entering the sound, the ironclad, under command of Captain J. W. Cooke, and her escort vessels were attacked by four double-ended
steamers and three smaller gunboats under Captain Melancton Smith. The
Albemarle opened attack late in the day. Leading
the first line of attack was the Union flagship, the Mattabesett. The Albemarle
returned her fire, destroying the launch and cutting away some of the standing and running rigging. The steamer Sassacus
struck the ironclad at top speed and stuck fast. The crew of the Albemarle
then sent a hundred-pound shot through the starboard boiler of the Union vessel and into her wardroom. The scalded men managed
to free the ship and they drifted out of range. Both sides then withdrew. The Albemarle struggled to return
to Plymouth for repairs. Only by throwing butter,
lard, and bacon into the boilers was it possible for the crew of the Confederate ironclad to raise enough steam to return
to Plymouth. The encounter is also known as the “Battle
of Batchelor’s Bay,” although the events took place in the sound some distance east of the bay.

CSS Albemarle v. United States Navy

Battle of Albemarle Sound

Analysis: In April 1864, Confederate forces, with
the aid of the new Confederate Ironclad ram CSS Albemarle, forced the surrender of the Union garrison at Plymouth, forcing them back and helping the infantry capture the town. Robert Hoke, commanding
Confederate forces in North Carolina, encouraged by his success at Plymouth attempted to retake New Bern, in May, which
had been under Union control since early in 1862. For his proposed attack on New Bern, Hoke again sought assistance from the
CSS Albemarle, which had been a decisive factor in the Battle of Plymouth. En route, however, were eight Union ships in Albemarle Sound under the command
of Melancton Smith.

James W. Cooke sailed the ram Albemarle out to attack the Federal gunboats on
May 5. He was accompanied by two unarmored gunboats, the Bombshell and Cotton Plant. They engaged four Union
ships, the USS Miami, Mattabesett, Sassacus and Wyalusing, mounting altogether more than 60 cannon. The Albemarle opened the fight, her first fire hitting six men on the Mattabesett.
The Confederate then maneuvered into ram, as she had done in the previous fight. However the Mattabesett was
able to deftly avoid this charge, and the Sassacus unleashed a volley directly into the Albemarle's side,
but the shell just bounced off the solid ironclad. When she turned her fire to the Bombshell she found a much easier
target, and soon forced the unarmored gunboat to surrender.

Seeing that his guns were useless against the Albermarle, Lieutenant Commander
Francis Roe of the Sassacus decided to ram. She struck the Confederate vessel squarely, but instead of punching a
whole in her and sending her to the bottem, the ships became twisted and entangled. Cooke ordered the Albermarle to
fire her guns, and at such a close range it was impossible to miss. Two shells smashed through the USS Sassacus,
and one of them smashed her boiler which send scalding steam through the ship. The Sassacus broke away and drifted
out of the fight, unable to sail without her boiler. The USS Miami continued the fight, but was unable to catch the
Albermarle in a net or hit her with a spar torpedo. The CSS Albemarle had sustained some damage in the fighting,
and eventually returned up the river to Plymouth. Although she had not gained a conclusive victory, she was successful in
disabling one ship, and engaging the squadron without incurring serious damage. For months she controlled a large section
of the river, as the Federals were unwilling to risk attacking the Confederate armorclad.

(Sources and related reading below.)

Recommended Reading:Confederate Ironclad 1861-65 (New Vanguard). Description: The creation
of a Confederate ironclad fleet was a miracle of ingenuity, improvisation and logistics. Surrounded by a superior enemy fleet,
Confederate designers adapted existing vessels or created new ones from the keel up with the sole purpose of breaking the
naval stranglehold on the nascent country. Continued below...

Her ironclads were built in remote cornfields, on small inland rivers or in naval yards within sight of
the enemy. The result was an unorthodox but remarkable collection of vessels, which were able to contest the rivers and coastal
waters of the South for five years. This title explains how these vessels worked, how they were constructed, how they were
manned and how they fought.

Recommended
Reading:A History of the Confederate Navy
(Hardcover). From Publishers Weekly: One of the most prominent European scholars of the Civil War weighs in with a provocative
revisionist study of the Confederacy's naval policies. For 27 years, University of Genoa history professor Luraghi (The Rise
and Fall of the Plantation South) explored archival and monographic sources on both sides of the Atlantic to develop a convincing
argument that the deadliest maritime threat to the South was not, as commonly thought, the Union's blockade but the North's
amphibious and river operations. Confederate Navy Secretary Stephen Mallory, the author shows, thus focused on protecting
the Confederacy's inland waterways and controlling the harbors vital for military imports. Continued below…

As a result,
from Vicksburg
to Savannah to Richmond, major
Confederate ports ultimately were captured from the land and not from the sea, despite the North's overwhelming naval strength.
Luraghi highlights the South's ingenuity in inventing and employing new technologies: the ironclad, the submarine, the torpedo.
He establishes, however, that these innovations were the brainchildren of only a few men, whose work, although brilliant,
couldn't match the resources and might of a major industrial power like the Union. Nor did
the Confederate Navy, weakened through Mallory's administrative inefficiency, compensate with an effective command system.
Enhanced by a translation that retains the verve of the original, Luraghi's study is a notable addition to Civil War maritime
history. Includes numerous photos.

Recommended
Reading:Iron Afloat: The Story of the Confederate Armorclads. Description: William N. Still's book is rightfully referred to as the standard of Confederate Naval history.
Accurate and objective accounts of the major and even minor engagements with Union forces are combined with extensive background
information. This edition has an enlarged section of historical drawings and sketches. Mr. Still explains the political background
that gave rise to the Confederate Ironclad program and his research is impeccable. An exhaustive literature listing rounds
out this excellent book. While strictly scientific, the inclusion of historical eyewitness accounts and the always fluent
style make this book a joy to read. This book is a great starting point.

Recommended Reading:Storm
over Carolina: The Confederate Navy's Struggle for Eastern North Carolina.Description: The struggle for control of the eastern
waters of North Carolina during the War Between the States
was a bitter, painful, and sometimes humiliating one for the Confederate navy. No better example exists of the classic adage,
"Too little, too late." Burdened by the lack of adequate warships, construction facilities, and even ammunition, the
South's naval arm fought bravely and even recklessly to stem the tide of the Federal invasion of North
Carolina from the raging Atlantic. Storm
Over Carolina is the account of the Southern navy's struggle in North
Carolina waters and it is a saga of crushing defeats interspersed with moments of brilliant and even
spectacular victories. It is also the story of dogged Southern determination and incredible perseverance in the face
of overwhelming odds. Continued below...

For most of
the Civil War, the navigable portions of the Roanoke, Tar, Neuse, Chowan, and Pasquotank rivers were
occupied by Federal forces. The Albemarle and Pamlico sounds, as well as most of the coastal towns and counties, were also
under Union control. With the building of the river ironclads, the Confederate navy at last could strike a telling blow against
the invaders, but they were slowly overtaken by events elsewhere. With the war grinding to a close, the last Confederate vessel
in North Carolina waters was destroyed. William T. Sherman
was approaching from the south, Wilmington was lost, and the
Confederacy reeled as if from a mortal blow. For the Confederate navy, and even more so for the besieged citizens of eastern
North Carolina, these were stormy days indeed. Storm Over Carolina describes their story, their struggle, their history.

Recommended Reading: Ironclads and Columbiads: The Coast
(The Civil War in North Carolina) (456 pages). Description:Ironclads and Columbiads covers some of the most
important battles and campaigns in the state. In January 1862, Union forces began in earnest to occupy crucial points on the
North Carolina coast. Within six months, Union army and
naval forces effectively controlled coastal North Carolina from the Virginia
line south to present-day MoreheadCity.
Union setbacks in Virginia, however, led to the withdrawal of many federal soldiers from North Carolina, leaving only enough
Union troops to hold a few coastal strongholds—the vital ports and railroad junctions. The South during the Civil War,
moreover, hotly contested the North’s ability to maintain its grip on these key coastal strongholds.

Recommended Reading: The Civil War in the Carolinas
(Hardcover). Description: Dan Morrill relates the experience
of two quite different states bound together in the defense of the Confederacy, using letters, diaries, memoirs, and reports.
He shows how the innovative operations of the Union army and navy along the coast and
in the bays and rivers of the Carolinas affected the general course of the war as well as
the daily lives of all Carolinians. He demonstrates the "total war" for North
Carolina's vital coastal railroads and ports. In the latter part of the war, he describes
how Sherman's operation cut out the heart of the last stronghold
of the South. Continued below...

The author
offers fascinating sketches of major and minor personalities, including the new president and state governors, Generals Lee,
Beauregard, Pickett, Sherman, D.H. Hill, and Joseph E. Johnston. Rebels and abolitionists, pacifists and unionists, slaves
and freed men and women, all influential, all placed in their context with clear-eyed precision. If he were wielding a needle
instead of a pen, his tapestry would offer us a complete picture of a people at war. Midwest Book Review:The Civil War in the Carolinas by civil war expert and historian
Dan Morrill (History Department, University of North Carolina at Charlotte, and Director of the Charlotte-Mecklenburg Historical
Society) is a dramatically presented and extensively researched survey and analysis of the impact the American Civil War had
upon the states of North Carolina and South Carolina, and the people who called these states their home. A meticulous, scholarly,
and thoroughly engaging examination of the details of history and the sweeping change that the war wrought for everyone, The
Civil War In The Carolinas is a welcome and informative addition to American Civil War Studies reference collections.

Sources: John G. Barrett, The Civil War in North Carolina (1963); William
G. Trotter, Ironclads and Columbiads: The Civil War in North Carolina, Volume III, The Coast (1989); Robert G. Elliott, Ironclads
of the Roanoke: Gilbert Elliott’s Albemarle (1994); State Library of North Carolina; Official Records of the Union and
Confederate Armies; National Park Service; North Carolina Office of Archives and History.